by Allison Pang
“She said she had a breakdown, but a ward seems so . . . extreme.” I frowned, trying to place the time frame. “I don’t know how long she’s been here.”
“It was a cover for her mother,” Nobu said. “For her own good, of course. A chance to stop talking about Faerie and music and things that ‘aren’t real.’ ” A shadow crossed his face. “I think she found me real enough, though.”
We ducked down another hallway, flattening against the wall as an orderly swept by, eyes dull and bloodshot.
“And just . . . uh . . . what is involved with eating a sin?” I asked, not really sure I wanted to know. My gaze slid sideways to Ion. “Is it anything like eating a soul?”
As far as I knew the incubus had never actually done it, but he’d nearly tried it on Maurice once, back when I was trapped in that awful Shadow Realm of a painting. Sometimes I felt as though Brystion had been treading a fine line along his daemonic heritage. Being born of the stuff of dreams and the Dark Path put him closer to Hell than the rest of us, but as he’d pointed out before, actions did make a difference. So what would happen if he did venture down that way?
Nobu cocked a brow at me. “I hardly think now is the time for such a discussion.” His face became sly. “If you like, perhaps I can eat one of your sins when we’re done.”
Ion tensed, his hand locking onto mine. “Careful, Peacock.”
The sin-eater snorted, but turned away, gesturing at us to follow. The maze of hallways continued until Nobu sighed. “My powers are fading. It’s too much to hide all of you and my movements from . . . Him.” he said finally. “We may have to try something else.”
I cocked a brow at him. This was something I could do. “Give me your hand.”
“You can’t be serious,” Brystion rumbled, his upper lip curling into a sneer.
Nobu blinked, realization dawning. “KeyStone. I had forgotten.”
“Yeah, well, don’t get too comfortable with it. It’s only until we get out of here.”
“Drain her, Peacock, and I’ll kill you.”
“My, my, jealous you’ll never know what this feels like again?”
I jabbed the daemon in the chest with my index finger. “Knock the shit off and give me your goddamned hand so we can do this and get the hell out of here.”
Nobu exchanged a nonplussed look with Ion. “Bossy thing,” he murmured, but he held out his free hand to me.
I slipped my fingers into his, opening up the things that made me a KeyStone, my inner self resonating at its own frequency, attempting to find a match in Nobu. The fallen angel’s eyes closed, his body twitching.
“Don’t fight me,” I murmured. “You have to want to let me in.”
He relaxed, the breath rushing out of him in a whoosh, and I seized the opportunity. For a moment we hovered there, his essence coyly rolling away from me, but I clamped down on it. There was always a chance this wouldn’t actually work, but as long as both of us were willing . . . Abruptly the visions assaulted my mind, like they always did.
. . . I told her. I told her this would only end in disaster. If I had been stronger, I could have eaten her sin and none of this would have happened . . .
. . . dark feathers, all around me, propelling me up and up and up, but it isn’t high enough. Below me, the CrossRoads streak into the darkness like the silver strands of a spider’s web. I will never be able to fly away . . .
. . . she’s in my arms, the caged bird is nearly free, and her skin is alabaster pale, but it’s her music that compels me and draws me in. It flutters out of reach like a delicate songbird and as much as I want to capture that part of her, if I try too hard, I’ll merely crush the life from her . . .
. . . oh gods . . . I have to let her go . . .
The bond snapped into place and we stared at each other. His chest rose and fell with an odd rhythm; he was clearly shaken. I could only wonder what he’d seen on my end, but whatever it was, it had startled him. The fact that I’d only really seen bits and pieces of his feelings for Melanie was not lost on me, and I wondered at his ability to hide away the rest of himself.
Some part of this must have shown in my expression, because a grim smile flickered over his face. “Much of who I am is owned by Him. I gave you the part that is not.” His bowed slightly. “Such as it is.”
“You really do care for her, don’t you?”
A sharp bark of laughter escaped him and he gestured at me with the violin. “Whatever gave you that idea?” He pursed his mouth and glanced over at Ion. “Interesting taste you have, dream-eater. This one might even be worth it.”
Ion scowled but didn’t bother to reply.
With the Glamour renewed, we made a hasty retreat down the next set of hallways. Phineas let out a chuffing noise in my backpack, but I merely shifted him somewhat. He thrust his nose through the opening, his nostrils quivering. “Are we there yet?”
Nobu raised a hand, pointing to another set of double doors, controlled by a badge swipe against the keypad. “Think that’s it.”
Brystion paused, shoving his hand through his hair. Dark circles purpled beneath his eyes, and I wondered again at how much strain his mortality was causing him.
“Hold up.”
I caught the scent of sulfur. “We aren’t alone.”
Phin’s nose quivered. “I thought I smelled something rotten.”
Nobu frowned. “If He has found her, my Master might be attempting His own rescue. After all,” he added bitterly, “she’s no good to Him dead.”
An orderly strolled past, humming a deranged version of David Bowie’s “Golden Years,” the vibrato rippling eerily down the hall. I flattened against the wall, the breeze of his passing lifting the bangs from my forehead.
I nudged Brystion. “There’s our stinky man.”
“Glamoured,” Phineas snorted.
“We’ll have to take him out quietly.” Nobu’s mouth twisted grimly as he glanced down at us. “And one of you will have to do it. My presence here will not be appreciated by Him and may lead to questions and . . . unpleasant things.”
“Now who’s a coward?” Brystion scowled, but gave a grudging nod. “I’ll handle it.”
The doors slid open with a chime and the four of us snuck through, trailing in the Glamoured daemon’s wake like shadows. He paused, head cocked as though he were listening, but he never stopped that awful humming, the sound of it grating against my ears.
He whisked down the linoleum hallways, shoes squeaking cheerfully, slowing down to read the numbers on each door. When he got to 807, he stopped and glanced inside, a dark smile on his face. Swiping his badge on the door, he entered the room—
—and was planted on the floor a moment later, Brystion’s knee on his back and one arm popping as he rucked it up, dislocating the shoulder.
“Don’t move,” the incubus snarled.
I barely spared a glance at them, my focus drawn to the skeletal figure in the bed.
Letting out a sharp cry, I rushed to her side. Melanie had always been pale, but her skin was now translucent, as though she were made up of bird bones and leaves. Her once-vibrant red curls lay matted and bedraggled. If I picked her up, her body would scatter to pieces.
A lone IV tube hung limp from her arm. “This isn’t a hospital,” I choked out. “They left her here to die. They don’t even have a monitor on her.”
Behind me, I heard a crack and a sigh. The rotten egg smell grew stronger and I knew Brystion had snapped the daemon’s neck. I couldn’t even be moved to shock over the death, as frozen as I was.
Then Melanie’s chest moved shallow and slow.
“Phin!” I yelled.
The unicorn looked up at her gravely. “I’m sorry, Abby. I have nothing left to give her.”
“That’s not good enough,” I sobbed, stroking her face, her lips desiccated against my thumb. I glanced up at Nobu, my jaw trembling. “The violin. Give it to her.”
He handed it to me and I thrust the neck into her palm.
Her hand jerked,
fingers snapping shut, but it seemed more instinctual than cognizant. Her mouth twitched, her eyes darting back and forth beneath the yellowed lids.
Nobu’s face had grown hard as he stared down at her, one hand outstretched as though he would touch her, and wherever his thoughts were, it wasn’t good. Abruptly his fingers fisted and he turned away.
“I cannot touch her,” he said harshly. “Or He will know I seek to circumvent His will.”
“Well ain’t that a bitch, Peacock?” Brystion staggered to his feet. “What the hell do we do with the body?”
Nobu exhaled. “I’ve got enough power left to Glamour it to look like her. It will buy us enough time should anyone check on our friend here. Someone take that IV out.”
With shaking fingers, I pulled back the tape, wincing at the bruises. Memories of my own extended time in the hospital loomed to the forefront of my mind but I shoved them away. That was the past.
I cocked a brow at him. “And whose side are you on, really?”
“Mine,” he said shortly, gesturing to Brystion with an odd little bow. “Please.”
“The things I do, Peacock.” With a grunt, Ion carefully slid his arms around Mel’s prone form, cradling her against his chest. Pushing the oily hair away from her forehead, he laid a kiss on her brow. “Hang in there.”
I glanced up to catch a look of pure envy flick over Nobu’s face, but he swallowed it down quickly.
“Sacrifices,” he murmured, hauling up the body of the daemon like a sack of garbage, dumping it onto the bed with a sneer. “This one will be expected to report soon. We should move.”
I snatched the badge from his waist. “Here’s our way out.”
Nobu nodded. A moment later and the body took on the semblance of Melanie, all the more creepy for its lack of movement. The fallen angel gave me a weary smile, and I felt the resulting pull of power on my end.
I gathered Phin into my bag, and cautiously peered down the hallway. Waving the others out of the room, I shut the door quietly behind me, sparing one last glance at the body in the bed.
Bad omens, indeed.
Sixteen
Melanie lay stiff and unmoving in her own bed, her face waxen and pale. The violin remained clutched in her skeletal fingers. Any effort at removing the instrument was met with steel-rod resistance. Slightly reassuring, though the lack of any movement was not. I pressed a damp cloth to her forehead.
She needed a bath something fierce, but she needed to wake up more. Brystion sat beside me, his hand on my leg. Through the doorway, Nobu paced like a caged thing, his usual smugness gone in the wake of the situation. His wings flared out and back and then disappeared altogether. Beyond him, Robert and Charlie sat on the sofa, Benjamin’s babbling filling the silence with much-needed levity. Phineas perched at the end of Melanie’s bed like a miniature equine gargoyle, his blue eyes staring at her intently.
The clink of dishes from the kitchen indicated Brandon was fixing up something. From the way my stomach was growling, I really hoped it wouldn’t be a liquid lunch.
We were gathered in Mel’s apartment, filled with its odd assortment of Celtic ornaments and instruments, amps and sheet music. Controlled chaos is what I’d always called it, with Melanie at the center of it all.
With her so quiet now, the clutter was overwhelming. Sonja brushed past Nobu, her own wings Glamoured away. She laid a hand on Brystion’s shoulder, leaning down to whisper something in his ear. He nodded once and followed her out of the room.
I found Melanie’s hand and squeezed it. “Please,” I murmured. “Please wake up.”
Nobu loomed over me, staring at her. “No change?”
Phineas shook his head. “None. I don’t know if it’s that she’s too weak at this point, or if she’s just unwilling to wake up.”
“We need a healer. I’ll TouchStone as many of them as we can find if it will help.” I slumped in the chair, my head feeling like it was stuffed with cotton. “In the meantime . . .” I closed my eyes. “I release you.”
The TouchStone bond between Nobu and me snapped with a metaphysical vibration, resulting in a startled grunt from him.
Nobu rubbed his jawline ruefully. “New experience for me.”
“Yeah, well, we’re past the danger point right now and I can’t afford to have you draining me. I’ve got too much riding on my ability to walk.” My stomach rumbled. “And it makes me hungry.”
“Well, then, I guess it’s good Brandon fixed lunch.” Brystion approached with a plate heaped with burgers. My belly roiled, but the protein was definitely needed, so I snagged the one on top and ate it, sucking a stray dollop of ketchup from my thumb.
“So what’s the plan? Can she be brought out of it?”
“I’m not sure it’s going to be as simple as all that, Abby. It’s not a natural coma—her body needs time to adjust to the proximity of the violin,” Phineas said, rubbing the nub of his horn on the lump of Melanie’s foot beneath the blankets. “And give me some of that. I’m hungry.”
Brystion sighed as Sonja stepped in behind him. I took another burger, broke off a piece, and fed it to Phineas.
“You need to tell her,” she said, her voice low.
“Tell me what?” I steeled myself against whatever new catastrophe was going to come hurtling itself at me. “I already know things are a little screwed up with whatever happened between me and Ion. Not sure what that has to do with Melanie, though.”
Sonja shifted uneasily. “It’s not about Melanie.”
I set down the last of my burger on the plate. “Enough with the bullshit. Spit it out.”
She shook her head. “Better if I show you.” Her gaze darted to Brystion and he nodded. “We can do it now. In fact, the sooner the better, I think.”
He gave me a wan smile. “I’ll have to see if I can meet you there. I don’t think I’ve ever really tried to fall asleep on purpose.”
I raised a brow. “Are we meeting in the Dreaming?”
Sonja nodded. “Yes. I think it’s time you saw my brother’s Dreaming Heart.”
“All right,” I said finally. “Let’s see what damage we can cause.” Both brother and sister winced at my choice of words and I sighed. “Once more into the breach, dear friends.”
My Dreaming Heart remained silent, the gate unlocking as I approached it to allow Sonja in. Behind me the outer scaffolding of my old Victorian was slowly being pieced together. A small thing, plain and simple, but it felt more like home now.
Perhaps it was only that I was no longer hiding behind my past to avoid thinking about my future, although why my inner brain had decided to go with a more rustic design, I wasn’t quite sure. I hadn’t had time to take a look inside, but the curling wisteria vines that crawled up the chimney let out a heavenly scent, the green all the more brilliant against the silvery stone.
A willow sapling sprouted behind the house, the wispy branches starting to unfurl tiny leaves, and a miniature brook trickled merrily into a deep black pool, the fireflies playing above it.
Sonja shook her head when she saw it. “You’ve changed it again.”
I shrugged. “Not on purpose. It seems to be manifesting as it will.” I waved her off. “Just show me what’s going on with Brystion.”
She stiffened. “Okay. Then let’s go.”
We walked out of the gate to the edge of the path like before, staring out at the darkness. “This shouldn’t be as hard. After all, the two of you have shared a rather intimate bond via your TouchStoning . . . not to mention he made his home here.”
I threw out my thoughts to the pinpricks of light dotting the sky before us. The bells in my hair chimed immediately, ringing with a laughing enthusiasm. Home . . . home . . . home . . .
In the distance came a faint echo in response. “There.” I pointed as the crystalline road, watching as it shivered.
“Yes,” she agreed, taking me by the hand.
I glanced up as we traversed the pathway, but if my sharks were around, they did not make
themselves known. An uneasy flutter took root in my belly, but perhaps they didn’t think they would be needed?
“So what is this all about?” I tried to squash the flush of nervousness in my belly. The Dreaming had always been such an intimate place for me and Ion, but always on his terms . . . and in my Heart. The idea of visiting him in his was disconcerting.
If I admitted the truth to myself, I was a little afraid of what I might see. If he had naked statues of me dotting the place, he and I would have to have words.
I said as much to Sonja and she snorted.
“Please. Do you think Ion would stoop to that level of cheese factor, even in his dreams?”
“Not on purpose,” I muttered. “Though it might just manifest.” And then there was only silence as we faded into the darkness. The bells rang out in small intervals, the responding sound coming louder and louder until we stood outside a gate very like my own.
A deep burnished gold, it was the same color Ion’s eyes turned when his incubus form was excited. Beyond the gate was a dark forest, trees clustered so thickly that no light seemed to pass through it.
“So how do we get in? Or will he meet us here?”
Sonja frowned. “It should be open. He knows we’re coming. I suspect you’ve got the key right there.” She pointed to the bells. “They certainly seem to be responding to this place.”
I hesitated, not sure I wanted to try to force myself in. If Ion had something he needed to show me, then it really should be on his terms.
“Brystion?” I called his name in a hoarse whisper, somewhat unsurprised when there was no response.
With a sigh, I shook the bells in my hair. Not much of a doorbell, but it might be enough to at least let him know it was us.
The gate shuddered at the sound, creaking open with a great whine. I winced at it, but didn’t resist when Sonja pulled me inside. The gate slammed shut behind us, the lock turning with a click.
We were engulfed in the woods, the trees pressing thick and suffocating around us. The hiss of pine needles was the only thing I could hear as they sifted off the branches. I blinked. For all that the trees seemed so robust from a distance, they were . . . dying.